Christmas Caroling

I love my dad.  He's seriously one of my favorite people in the whole world.  One of the things I love about him is that it's impossible to be with him and not have fun.  He brings cheer wherever he goes, and this becomes especially fun at Christmas.  Every year for the past ten years, my dad has requested that as his Christmas present the whole family go Christmas caroling in the neighborhood.  We always grumble and say, "Seriously?  We're doing this AGAIN?"  But secretly we always love it. 

Have you heard my dad sing?  No?  Well, have you heard a cat yowl after its tail got stepped on?  It's basically the same thing.  As a matter of fact, no one in my family is particularly musical.  Cara's got a pretty good voice, but no one hears it over my dad's hollers of "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing."  Every year I think we're going to completely humiliate ourselves, but here's the thing: no one cares that we're bad!  They're always just so happy to have "old fashioned carolers" come by their house.  Sometimes the fact that we're bad works to our advantage, because then the people at the door decide to sing along with us and that helps drown out the bad notes a little bit.

This year we went to Chicago the weekend before Christmas to visit my aunts and uncles.  My dad declared that rather than give up his traditional caroling, we would just do it in my uncle's neighborhood!  Actually, this sounded like a great idea to me - I never have to see any of those people again. 

We all (11 of us!) bundled up and went out caroling.  It was a lot of fun, just as it is every year.  Here were a few of my highlights:

1. One crazy lady loved us so much that she offered us a bottle of wine and $20!  We said no, obviously, since caroling is our gift to them and we're not doing it for money.  The lady got super mad and was like, "What the hell?!  That shit don't fly here!  You have to take something!!"  Uh....walk away quickly, children, walk away.  My cousins are 7 and 9.  What a great display of Christmas cheer for them to see.  Eeeek!

2. We walked up to one house just as a man was getting out of his car.  My dad said, "Hurry up, guys, SING NOW!"  So we awkwardly stood there and serenaded the one guy as he stood out in front of his garage.  When we were finished he knocked on the garage, which I thought was kind of weird because how is someone in the house going to hear him when he's knocking on the garage?  To my surprise, the garage door opened and revealed the coolest man cave ever!  It seriously looked like a beer commercial waiting to happen.  There was a giant screen TV, old couches, neon beer signs on the walls, and tall heat lamps to keep the garage warm.  The guy pulled out a cigar and asked if we wanted to watch the Bears game with  him and his buddies (who were already in the man cave).  We said no, but that place was super cool.

3. We went up to one house and started singing, and two beagles jumped up to the window and started howling (it looked as if they were singing along with us!).  We sang with them for a little while until a kid (around six years old) came to the door.  He saw us through the side window and was about to answer the door when he looked down and realized that he was in his underwear.  Embarrassed, he turned and sprinted up the stairs without opening the door.  Ha ha!  We just kept singing until his mom came and opened the door for us. 

It was another eventful year for Knasel caroling.  Now it's Christmas Eve and I'm sitting here blogging even though I should be getting ready for church, but I'm not going to go because poor Rex has been throwing up all day and I have to tend to him.  Poor guy!  If you read this before tomorrow, pray that he gets better for Christmas!  Magic always happens on Christmas Eve, right?  It could happen.